Tesla to amp up number of charging stations in anticipation of Model 3 rollout

Tesla CEO Elon Musk said the electric-car maker would reveal plans for a commercial truck and pickup truck.
Wochit

SAN FRANCISCO — Tesla will double the number of charging locations available to owners of its 200,000 electric vehicles by the end of the year, the company announced in a blog post Monday.

Since 2012, Tesla has built 5,400 Supercharger stations (expansive plazas that look like gas stations) and populated 9,000 hotels, restaurants and malls with wall-mounted Destination Charging connectors. By 2018, those numbers should hit 10,000 and 15,000 respectively.

Although Tesla has Supercharger stations in 31 countries, U.S. owners stand to benefit most from the new charging stations.

"
In North America, we’ll increase the number of Superchargers by 150 percent, and in California alone we’ll add more than 1,000 Superchargers," the post reads. "We’re moving full speed on site selection and many sites will soon enter construction to open in advance of the summer travel season."

Tesla's statement notes that priority will be given to the busiest routes trafficked by Tesla owners. In those corridors — which according to a map of proposed new stations include the Northeast and Pacific Northwest — Supercharger stations will be able to accommodate dozens of vehicles at a time. Charging time varies according to the model. Most owners recharge their vehicles overnight at home.

Red dots represent current locations of Tesla Supercharger stations, while grey dots indicate locations where the company plans to add more stations in 2017.(Photo: Tesla)

In January, Tesla announced a change in charging fee policy. All cars built before Jan. 15 will continue to benefit from free access to Supercharger stations, even if the cars change hands in the future.

But cars built after Jan. 15 will be eligible for an annual credit of roughly 1,000 miles of electric charge, after which owners will pay for an infusion of electrons. Tesla estimates that fill-ups for a trip from California to New York would cost around $120.

Charging stations are considered critical to increasing public acceptance of electric vehicles, whose batteries limit driving range to an outer limit of 300 miles. That makes commuting in an EV a non-issue, but road trips become potentially worrisome.

Tesla Model 3 unveil.(Photo: Tesla)

The distance between Los Angeles and San Francisco is around 400 miles, which is why Tesla has positioned a Supercharger station midway down the state.

The expansion is timed to the imminent rollout of the Tesla Model 3 sedan, which with a base price of $30,000 costs a third of the automaker's loaded Model S and X vehicles. Production of the Model 3 is slated to begin this summer.

CEO Elon Musk is pinning great hopes on the car, which if embraced by buyers could quintuple Tesla output to around 500,000 units a year.

That sort of production could help assuage investor fears about profitability. Tesla is currently valued at $50 billion, a staggering number for a car company making around 100,000 cars a year.